There is an easy solution. Make the Greencard priority date portable. Or go by European Union's solution. GIve a Greencard automatically without company sponsorship after you have spent 5 years in the country. If you were good enough to be part of the US workforce(and pay taxes) for 5 years you should be good enough to be here permanently. Or take the sponsorship of immigration out of private company hands. Immigration should be in govt hands. A point system based immigration where English skills, college degrees and US work experience count higher than country of origin or relatives in the country would be fairer.
There is a big misconception that workers are training their replacement. They are not training they are doing knowledge transfer. There is a lot of configuration and company specific practices in any IT setup. It would take considerable time to reverse engineer the details if proper documentation has not been done (which face it is not done otherwise the current employees would be efficient enough to not need replacement)
When outsourcing of a function is done, the company is not really replacing the workers - they are replacing the management. Its an admission that the company does not know how to manage IT workers and has been sent on one runaround too many. The IT outsourcing companies have seen it all and know how to manage IT work. They could reuse the same employees being replaced and have better outcomes. Why they don't rehire the same folks is they are worried that these folks will resent giving up their their cushy positions and having to actually work for a living and thus will sabotage.
Mostly work which is replaced through outsourcing is something that a trained monkey can do. However monkeys with bad attitudes cant be trained. What the companies are using H1 for is a vital skill lacking in the American workforce - team spirit. Noone said the missing skill had to be IT skills. Heck the H1 was created for Models where the missing skill was bigger boobs.
One word - oil. America's wealth is built on being the Saudi Arabia of the early 20th century. There was a lot of capital created by the robber barons and they invested it in multiple companies which could afford to innovate due to the capital cushion . America still produces more oil than Saudi and throughout the last 120 years has been one of the top 2 or 3 producers. With cheap oil= cheap energy everything becomes easier. India has negligible amounts of oil. Don't kid yourself that Americans are rich because they are superior, they are just lucky.
A bonus word - immigrants. In every generation the wealth of America attracts the cream from around the world. They keep the innovation factory running. Even though their 1st and 2nd generation descendants revert to the American mean it doesnt matter as newer , smarter, hungrier immigrants keep coming.
All I am saying absolute freedom of choice does not exist . its an illusion. As social animals we live in society and hence we follow societies' rules as we get benefits from it. Such rules only work when everyone follow them even though a minority may not agree with them. Same thing about a Union shop - it may restrict your choice but it is beneficial to the majority hence it exists
If Apple wants Banks to cooperate by opening their payment network to iPhones , Apple must open up the iPhone NFC to mobile wallets from Banks. A competition commission cannot say its anti-competitive for incumbents to block Apple Pay but its not anti-competitive for Apple to not allow access to the NFC chip in an iPhone.
So you want govt to deal with it as the Union has higher overheads. The govt also has overheads. They are not local to the factory so they probably will have to have more employees in order to ensure the regulations are followed. Also they cannot be flexible like a Union can and make exceptions for a factory/business in trouble. Small govt advocates should support Unions as it avoids the need for govt to hire thousands of inspectors and labor advocates to enforce the labor laws. Maybe Unions can be funded by the govt instead of through dues as they are saving Govt money but Govt lobbyists would have an heart attack
California is a Right to work state. Right to work deals with notice period. In fact Right to Work states need Unions more as there are no protections from the State so the Union is your only protection. That and a hot job market where there are other people ready to hire you. Unfortunately for Tesla workers there are no other car companies in the area so that doesnt apply as it does for Tech workers. Tech workers can just leave abusive employees or if they are on H1B do the minimum possible till they get their Green Cards and then leave. Tech employers understand this and try to treat their workers well. Tesla on the other hand has no such constraints.
How is that different from having to be ruled by a President which only a small plurality(not even a majority) of the people wanted (I am taking about Bill Clinton). Democracy means the majorities will prevails and the Constitution and courts protect the minority from majority abuse. Unions elected by Majority are no different from govts elected by majority. There are laws to prevent the abuse of the workers who were against a Union. Enforce those laws rather than crying about Unions.
Tesla sells premium priced cars. Part of why people are willing to pay such prices are they think with a factory in California Tesla's costs are higher . The other assumption is that with workers paid more than in the rest of the country the quality must be higher. If Tesla is actually paying even the same as in other car companies in other parts of the country Tesla is cheating its customers.
Its called VC funding. You invest in a loss making Union where no dues are coming in for the growth. You will make your revenue/dues when you have captured market share (all/most employees are in the union). If you are in Silicon Valley you should understand this. Unions are doing what any good business should doo - grow or perish. Need to capture new markets all the time. If that needs employing a loss leader so be it.
Given that he grew up as a Multimillionaires son dont think this was a case of money going to his head. This was a case of spoilt rich kid continuing his normal lifestyle while running a company and normal people (who have not been exposed to the multimillionaire lifestyle) not being able to understand the behaviour. The point is he does not need the company to be rich, he is already rich. Most successfull startup founders need the company to be successfull and the company is their first priority.
India govts job is not to help Apple innovate. Its to build manufacturing ecosystems in India so Indians can have employment. Access to an Indian consumer market is a good lever to use. India already has better and cheaper phones than the iphone so its not a critical import its a luxury consumption item.
India does have fabs just not the latest ones which can make CPUs. There are many fabs making chips for televisions, radios and phones. Most of the surrounding chipset can be locally sourced with maybe the touchscreen, CPU and battery being imported. Also the example of Maruti (Suzuki India) shows that once the final assembly moves to India the part manfacturers also move lines to be near the final assembly. It even saves on transport costs for Apple for phones to be sold in Indian Subcontinent or Africa as India is closer to Africa than China. China has become expensive and other competing countries like Vietnam dont have a large enough local market to make manufacturing locally worth it so slowly most manufacturing is going to move to India (if it stays manual) or move to USA (if its automated). Plus Apple can play games with the value - Apple employs more than 20000 contractors from big Indian outsourcing companies. These contractors provide at least 20-30% of the value of the software which goes into an iPhone and the support around it. That support and R&D cost is easily 30% of the cost of an iPhone so Apple can claim 10% value of an iPhone based upon using outsourced IT and software development. It can claim another 10% as cost of the Retail stores and logistics in India. SO it actually needs to move only 10% of the manufacturing value to hit the needed 30%. By doing this minimal change they beat a 50% import tax and get to open dedicated Retail Stores. IT just makes sense. Should have and would have happened long ago if Jobs hadnt hated India so much (he went there as a hippy in his pre Apple days and had his luggage swindled and had to beg for his food and travel money to get back) Cook doesnt have the same hangups about India.
India taxes any imports of phones at 50%. iPhones cost 1000$ plus in India. If Apple manufactures in India they can finally start competing in the Indian market. This is not about forcing all production to India. This is about balance of trade. After gold the highest dollar outflow from India is for electronics. The Indian govt is trying to minimize this by forcing partial(30%) manufacturing in India. No different from US imposing import taxes on BMWs made in Germany but not on BMWs made in South Carolina
The extra week was the week between Christmas and New Year. Definitely not a dull week as all Apple gift cards given as gifts are redeemed during this week and the revenue recorded
Apple had a 14 week Quarter as compared to a 13 week quarter and grew revenue 3.9%. So for a 7% longer period a 3.9% higher revenue looks like a drop . No wonder the profit dropped as 14 weeks means 7% more costs but only 3.9% more revenue so profit has to fall.
Those days are long gone. Nowadays at Apple Infosys and Wipro are actually losing money on the contractors they have on site. They make it up by making 300% on the folks offshore. The business model needs that for every person onsite they have 2 offshore. They are kind of ectatic about Trump cracking down on H1Bs. They will either get to raise onsite rates with Apple or get to add more people offshore instead on onsite (claiming the lack of available people). Either will improve their bottomline
Slashdot Mirror
There is an easy solution. Make the Greencard priority date portable. Or go by European Union's solution. GIve a Greencard automatically without company sponsorship after you have spent 5 years in the country. If you were good enough to be part of the US workforce(and pay taxes) for 5 years you should be good enough to be here permanently.
Or take the sponsorship of immigration out of private company hands. Immigration should be in govt hands.
A point system based immigration where English skills, college degrees and US work experience count higher than country of origin or relatives in the country would be fairer.
There is a big misconception that workers are training their replacement. They are not training they are doing knowledge transfer. There is a lot of configuration and company specific practices in any IT setup. It would take considerable time to reverse engineer the details if proper documentation has not been done (which face it is not done otherwise the current employees would be efficient enough to not need replacement)
When outsourcing of a function is done, the company is not really replacing the workers - they are replacing the management. Its an admission that the company does not know how to manage IT workers and has been sent on one runaround too many. The IT outsourcing companies have seen it all and know how to manage IT work. They could reuse the same employees being replaced and have better outcomes. Why they don't rehire the same folks is they are worried that these folks will resent giving up their their cushy positions and having to actually work for a living and thus will sabotage.
Mostly work which is replaced through outsourcing is something that a trained monkey can do. However monkeys with bad attitudes cant be trained. What the companies are using H1 for is a vital skill lacking in the American workforce - team spirit. Noone said the missing skill had to be IT skills. Heck the H1 was created for Models where the missing skill was bigger boobs.
One word - oil. America's wealth is built on being the Saudi Arabia of the early 20th century.
There was a lot of capital created by the robber barons and they invested it in multiple companies which could afford to innovate due to the capital cushion .
America still produces more oil than Saudi and throughout the last 120 years has been one of the top 2 or 3 producers. With cheap oil= cheap energy everything becomes easier. India has negligible amounts of oil. Don't kid yourself that Americans are rich because they are superior, they are just lucky.
A bonus word - immigrants. In every generation the wealth of America attracts the cream from around the world. They keep the innovation factory running. Even though their 1st and 2nd generation descendants revert to the American mean it doesnt matter as newer , smarter, hungrier immigrants keep coming.
How will space colonization ever takeoff if the Earth is not made uninhabitable?
All I am saying absolute freedom of choice does not exist . its an illusion. As social animals we live in society and hence we follow societies' rules as we get benefits from it. Such rules only work when everyone follow them even though a minority may not agree with them. Same thing about a Union shop - it may restrict your choice but it is beneficial to the majority hence it exists
Well I can see both the positive and negative sides of the issue.
If Apple wants Banks to cooperate by opening their payment network to iPhones , Apple must open up the iPhone NFC to mobile wallets from Banks. A competition commission cannot say its anti-competitive for incumbents to block Apple Pay but its not anti-competitive for Apple to not allow access to the NFC chip in an iPhone.
Thats hardly a neutral comment
So you want govt to deal with it as the Union has higher overheads. The govt also has overheads. They are not local to the factory so they probably will have to have more employees in order to ensure the regulations are followed. Also they cannot be flexible like a Union can and make exceptions for a factory/business in trouble. Small govt advocates should support Unions as it avoids the need for govt to hire thousands of inspectors and labor advocates to enforce the labor laws. Maybe Unions can be funded by the govt instead of through dues as they are saving Govt money but Govt lobbyists would have an heart attack
California is a Right to work state. Right to work deals with notice period. In fact Right to Work states need Unions more as there are no protections from the State so the Union is your only protection. That and a hot job market where there are other people ready to hire you. Unfortunately for Tesla workers there are no other car companies in the area so that doesnt apply as it does for Tech workers. Tech workers can just leave abusive employees or if they are on H1B do the minimum possible till they get their Green Cards and then leave. Tech employers understand this and try to treat their workers well. Tesla on the other hand has no such constraints.
How is that different from having to be ruled by a President which only a small plurality(not even a majority) of the people wanted (I am taking about Bill Clinton). Democracy means the majorities will prevails and the Constitution and courts protect the minority from majority abuse. Unions elected by Majority are no different from govts elected by majority. There are laws to prevent the abuse of the workers who were against a Union. Enforce those laws rather than crying about Unions.
Tesla sells premium priced cars. Part of why people are willing to pay such prices are they think with a factory in California Tesla's costs are higher . The other assumption is that with workers paid more than in the rest of the country the quality must be higher. If Tesla is actually paying even the same as in other car companies in other parts of the country Tesla is cheating its customers.
Its called VC funding. You invest in a loss making Union where no dues are coming in for the growth. You will make your revenue/dues when you have captured market share (all/most employees are in the union). If you are in Silicon Valley you should understand this. Unions are doing what any good business should doo - grow or perish. Need to capture new markets all the time. If that needs employing a loss leader so be it.
"No babes for you"
For the script kiddies its a Seinfeld reference
Without the trappings you wont be able to raise the money. Fake it till you make it.
Given that he grew up as a Multimillionaires son dont think this was a case of money going to his head. This was a case of spoilt rich kid continuing his normal lifestyle while running a company and normal people (who have not been exposed to the multimillionaire lifestyle) not being able to understand the behaviour. The point is he does not need the company to be rich, he is already rich. Most successfull startup founders need the company to be successfull and the company is their first priority.
Already been discussed on Slashdot day of earnings release Fudging the Math
India govts job is not to help Apple innovate. Its to build manufacturing ecosystems in India so Indians can have employment. Access to an Indian consumer market is a good lever to use. India already has better and cheaper phones than the iphone so its not a critical import its a luxury consumption item.
India does have fabs just not the latest ones which can make CPUs. There are many fabs making chips for televisions, radios and phones. Most of the surrounding chipset can be locally sourced with maybe the touchscreen, CPU and battery being imported. Also the example of Maruti (Suzuki India) shows that once the final assembly moves to India the part manfacturers also move lines to be near the final assembly. It even saves on transport costs for Apple for phones to be sold in Indian Subcontinent or Africa as India is closer to Africa than China. China has become expensive and other competing countries like Vietnam dont have a large enough local market to make manufacturing locally worth it so slowly most manufacturing is going to move to India (if it stays manual) or move to USA (if its automated).
Plus Apple can play games with the value - Apple employs more than 20000 contractors from big Indian outsourcing companies. These contractors provide at least 20-30% of the value of the software which goes into an iPhone and the support around it. That support and R&D cost is easily 30% of the cost of an iPhone so Apple can claim 10% value of an iPhone based upon using outsourced IT and software development. It can claim another 10% as cost of the Retail stores and logistics in India. SO it actually needs to move only 10% of the manufacturing value to hit the needed 30%. By doing this minimal change they beat a 50% import tax and get to open dedicated Retail Stores. IT just makes sense. Should have and would have happened long ago if Jobs hadnt hated India so much (he went there as a hippy in his pre Apple days and had his luggage swindled and had to beg for his food and travel money to get back) Cook doesnt have the same hangups about India.
India taxes any imports of phones at 50%. iPhones cost 1000$ plus in India. If Apple manufactures in India they can finally start competing in the Indian market. This is not about forcing all production to India. This is about balance of trade. After gold the highest dollar outflow from India is for electronics. The Indian govt is trying to minimize this by forcing partial(30%) manufacturing in India. No different from US imposing import taxes on BMWs made in Germany but not on BMWs made in South Carolina
Yes
IBM is older than Ford thats how long.
The extra week was the week between Christmas and New Year. Definitely not a dull week as all Apple gift cards given as gifts are redeemed during this week and the revenue recorded
Apple had a 14 week Quarter as compared to a 13 week quarter and grew revenue 3.9%. So for a 7% longer period a 3.9% higher revenue looks like a drop . No wonder the profit dropped as 14 weeks means 7% more costs but only 3.9% more revenue so profit has to fall.
Those days are long gone. Nowadays at Apple Infosys and Wipro are actually losing money on the contractors they have on site. They make it up by making 300% on the folks offshore. The business model needs that for every person onsite they have 2 offshore.
They are kind of ectatic about Trump cracking down on H1Bs. They will either get to raise onsite rates with Apple or get to add more people offshore instead on onsite (claiming the lack of available people). Either will improve their bottomline